From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: jmcbray@carcosa.net (Jason F. McBrayer) Subject: GTD, Projects, and Next Actions in org-mode Date: Thu, 03 Aug 2006 16:36:51 -0400 Message-ID: References: <3dbac09fcc4853019690ee76c8c4a73f@science.uva.nl> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Return-path: Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1G8kVp-0006Fg-1M for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Thu, 03 Aug 2006 17:13:49 -0400 Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1G8kVj-0006Dx-21 for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Thu, 03 Aug 2006 17:13:47 -0400 Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1G8kVi-0006Du-Sv for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Thu, 03 Aug 2006 17:13:42 -0400 Received: from [24.25.9.100] (helo=ms-smtp-01.southeast.rr.com) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.52) id 1G8kZ8-0002Xb-N8 for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Thu, 03 Aug 2006 17:17:14 -0400 Received: from bertrand.carcosa.net (cpe-024-168-194-241.sc.res.rr.com [24.168.194.241]) by ms-smtp-01.southeast.rr.com (8.13.6/8.13.6) with ESMTP id k73KaqoF002061 for ; Thu, 3 Aug 2006 16:36:53 -0400 (EDT) In-Reply-To: <3dbac09fcc4853019690ee76c8c4a73f@science.uva.nl> (Carsten Dominik's message of "Fri, 7 Jul 2006 08:35:16 +0200") List-Id: "General discussions about Org-mode." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Sender: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org To: emacs-orgmode I thought I'd ask to see how other people who are using org for Getting Things Done are handling projects and their relationship to Next Actions. I've tried out several approaches, and while I can rule out a few as no good, there are some with enough plusses and minuses to keep me from being really happy with any of them. My first go was to have a top-level category for projects, with a headline for each project under that. This worked for keeping track of my list of projects, but it didn't give me any way to tell what project a Next Action was associated with. My next attempt was to mix together projects and next actions, with next actions coming hierarchically under the project they were associated with. Projects have a tag unique to that project, but distinct from the tags I am using for contexts (contexts start with @, projects with nothing). This works, but the only way to get a list of projects is to either look manually through the file, or get the list of tags and ignore the ones that are contexts. I've tried two others: one is to make PROJECT an org-todo-keyword. This makes it very easy to get a list of projects, with the negative side effect that projects can show up in context lists if they are tagged with a context so that their Next Actions can inherit it (e.g., home improvements are all tagged @Home). This would work fine if I didn't use tag inheritance, or was conscientious about not putting contexts in projects. The other thing I've tried is to make "Project" a tag. This obviously works only if one is not using tag inheritance --- if you're not, then it's easy to get a list of projects, but if you are, you'll get all your next actions, too. What are other people doing to keep track of their projects? Is having projects listable all that important? -- +-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Jason F. McBrayer jmcbray@carcosa.net | | A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, | | even though we do not love it. -- Dogen |